JOURNAL OF A WEST INDIA PROPRIETOR,
Kept During A Residence In The Island Of Jamaica.
By Matthew Gregory Lewis
Author of “The Monk,” “The Castle Spectre,” “Tales Of Wonder,” &c.
London: John Murray, Albemarle Street.
MDCCCXXXIV
“I WOULD GIVE MANY A SUGAR CANE,
MAT. LEWIS WERE ALIVE AGAIN!”
BYRON.
[Illustration: 0001]
[Illustration: 0007]
ADVERTISEMENT.
The following Journals of two residences in Jamaica, in 1815-16, and in
1817, are now printed from the MS. of Mr. Lewis; who died at sea, on the
voyage homewards from the West Indies, in the year 1818.
JOURNAL OF A WEST INDIA PROPRIETOR
Expect our sailing in a few hours. But although the vessel left the
Docks on Saturday, she did not reach this place till three o’clock on
Thursday, the 9th. The captain now tells me, that we may expect to sail
certainly in the afternoon of to-morrow, the 10th. I expect the ship’s
cabin to gain greatly by my two days’ residence at the “--------------,”
which nothing can exceed for noise, dirt, and dulness. Eloisa would
never have established “black melancholy” at the Paraclete as its
favourite residence, if she had happened to pass three days at an inn
at Gravesend: nowhere else did I ever see the sky look so dingy, and the
river “_Nunc alio patriam quaero sub sole jacentem_.”--Virgil.
1815. NOVEMBER 8.
(WEDNESDAY)
I left London, and reached Gravesend at nine in the morning, having been
taught to exso dirty; to be sure, the place has all the advantages of
an English November to assist it in those particulars. Just now, too,
a carriage passed my windows, conveying on board a cargo of passengers,
who seemed sincerely afflicted at the thoughts of leaving their dear
native land! The pigs squeaked, the ducks quacked, and the fowls
screamed; and all so dolefully, as clearly to prove, that _theirs_ was
no dissembled sorrow? And after them (more affecting than all) came
a wheelbarrow, with a solitary porker tied in a basket, with his head
hanging over on one side, and his legs sticking out on the other, who
neither grunted nor moved, nor gave any signs of life, but seemed to
be of quite the same opinion with Hannah More’s heroine, “Grief is for
_little_ wrongs; despair for mine!”
As Miss O’Neil is to play “Elwina” for the first time to-morrow, it is
a thousand pities that she had not the previous advantage of seeing the
speechless despondency of this poor pig; it might have furnished her
with some valuable hints, and enabled her to convey more perfectly to
the audience the “expressive silence” of irremediable distress.
NOVEMBER 10.
At four o’clock in the afternoon, I embarked on board the “Sir Godfrey
Webster,” Captain Boyes. On approaching the vessel, we heard the loudest
of all possible shrieks proceeding from a boat lying near her: and who
should prove to be the complainant, but my former acquaintance, the
despairing pig, He had recovered his voice to protest against entering
the ship: I had already declared against climbing up the accommodation
ladder; the pig had precisely the very same objection. So a _soi-disant_
chair, being a broken bucket, was let down for us, and the pig and
myself entered the vessel by the same conveyance; only pig had the
precedence, and was hoisted up first. The ship proceeded three miles,
and then the darkness obliged us to come to an anchor. There are only
two other cabin passengers, a Mr. J------ and a Mr. S------; the
latter is a planter in the “May-Day Mountains,” Jamaica: he wonders,
considering how much benefit Great Britain derives from the West Indies,
that government is not careful to build more churches in them, and is of
opinion, that “hedicating the negroes is the only way to make them appy;
indeed, in his umble hopinion, hedication his hall in hall!”
NOVEMBER 11.
We sailed at six o’clock, passed through “Nob’s Hole,” the “Girdler’s
Hole,” and “the Pan” (all very dangerous sands, and particularly the
last, where at times we had only one foot water below us), by half past
four, and at five came to an anchor in the Queen’s Channel. Never having
seen any thing of the kind before, I was wonderfully pleased with the
manoeuvring of several large ships, which passed through the sands at
the same time with us: their motions seemed to be effected with as much
ease and dexterity as if they had been crane-necked carriages; and the
effect as they pursued each other’s track and windings was perfectly
beautiful.
NOVEMBER 12. (SUNDAY.)
The wind was contrary, and we had to beat up the whole way; we did not
reach the Downs till past four o’clock, and, as there were above sixty
vessels arrived before us, we had some difficulty in finding a safe
berth. At length we anchored in the Lower Roads, about four miles off
Deal. We can see very clearly the double lights in the vessel moored
off the Goodwin sands: it is constantly inhabited by two families, who
reside there alternately every fortnight, except when the weather delays
the exchange. The “Sir Godfrey Webster” is a vessel of 600 tons, and was
formerly in the East India service. I have a very clean cabin, a place
for my books, and every thing is much more comfortable than I expected;
the wind, however, is completely west, the worst that we could have, and
we must not even expect a change till the full moon. The captain pointed
out a man to me to-day, who had been with him in a violent storm off
the Bermudas. For six hours together, the flashes of lightning were so
unintermitting, that the eye could not sustain them: at one time, the
ship seemed to be completely in a blaze; and the man in question (who
was then standing at the wheel, near the captain) suddenly cried out,
“I don’t know what has happened to me, but I can neither see nor stand;”
and he fell down upon the deck. He was taken up and carried below; and
it appeared that the lightning had affected his eyes and legs, in a
degree to make him both blind and lame, though the captain, who was
standing by his side, had received no injury: in three or four days, the
man was quite well again. In this storm, no less than thirteen vessels
were dismasted, or otherwise shattered by the lightning.
Sea Terms.--_Windward, from_ whence the wind blows; _leeward, to_ which
it blows; _starboard_, the _right_ of the stern; _larboard_, the _left_;
_starboard helm_, when you go to the left; but when to the right,
instead of larboard helm, _helm a-port_; _luff you may_, go nearer to
the wind; _theis (thus)_ you are near enough; _luff no near_, you
are too near the wind; the _tiller_, the handle of the rudder; the
_capstan_, the weigher of the anchor; the _buntlines_, the ropes which
move the body of the sail, the _bunt_ being the body; the _bowlines_,
those which spread out the sails, and make them swell.
NOVEMBER 13.
At six this morning, came on a tremendous gale of wind; the captain
says, that he never experienced a heavier. However, we rode it out with
great success, although, at one time, it was bawled out that we were
driving; and, at another, a brig which lay near us broke from her
moorings, and came bearing down close upon us. The danger, indeed, from
the difference of size, was all upon the side of the brig; but, luckily,
the vessels cleared each other. This evening she has thought it as well
to remove further from so dangerous a neighbourhood. There is a little
cabin boy on board, and Mr. J------ has brought with him a black
terrier; and these two at first sight swore to each other an eternal
friendship, in the true German style. It is the boy’s first voyage, and
he is excessively sea-sick; so he has been obliged to creep into his
hammock, and his friend, the little black terrier, has crept into the
hammock with him. A boat came from the shore this evening, and reported
that several vessels have been dismasted, lost their anchors, and
injured in various ways. A brig, which was obliged to make for Ramsgate,
missed the pier, and was dashed to pieces completely; the crew, however,
were saved, all except the pilot; who, although he was brought on shore
alive, what between bruises, drowning, and fright, had suffered so much,
that he died two hours afterwards. The weather has now again become
calm; but it is still full west.
NOVEMBER 14. (TUESDAY.)
THE HOURS.
Ne’er were the zephyrs known disclosing
More sweets, than when in Tempe’s shades
They waved the lilies, where, reposing,
Sat four and twenty lovely maids.
Those lovely maids were called “the Hours,”
The charge of Virtue’s flock they kept;
And each in turn employ’d her powers
To guard it, while her sisters slept.
False Love, how simple souls thou cheatest!
In myrtle bower, that traitor near
Long watch’d an Hour, the softest, sweetest!
The evening Hour, to shepherds dear. *
In tones so bland he praised her beauty,
Such melting airs his pipe could play,
The thoughtless Hour forgot her duty,
And fled in Love’s embrace away.
Meanwhile the fold was left unguarded--
The wolf broke in--the lambs were slain:
And now from Virtue’s train discarded,
With tears her sisters speak their pain.
Time flies, and still they weep; for never
The fugitive can time restore:
An Hour once fled, has fled for ever,
And all the rest shall smile no more!
* L’heure du berger.
NOVEMBER 15.
The wind altered sufficiently to allow us to escape from the Downs;
and at dusk we were off Beachy Head. This morning, the steward left the
trap-door of the store-hole open; of course, I immediately contrived to
step into it, and was on the point of being precipitated to the
bottom, among innumerable boxes of grocery, bags of biscuit, and porter
barrels;--where a broken limb was the _least_ that I could expect.
Luckily, I fell across the corner of the trap, and managed to support
myself, till I could effect my escape with a bruised knee, and the loss
of a few inches of skin from my left arm.
NOVEMBER 16.
Off the Isle of Wight.
NOVEMBER 17.
Off the St. Alban’s Head. Sick to death! My temples throbbing, my head
burning, my limbs freezing, my mouth all fever, my stomach all nausea,
my mind all disgust.
NOVEMBER 18.
Off the Lizard, the last point of England.
NOVEMBER 19. (SUNDAY.)
At one this morning, a violent gust of wind came on; and, at the rate of
ten miles an hour, carried us through the Chops of the Channel, formed
by the Scilly Rocks and the Isle of Ushant. But I thought, that the
advance was dearly purchased by the terrible night which the storm made
us pass. The wind roaring, the waves dashing against the stern, till at
last they beat in the quarter gallery; the ship, too, rolling from side
to side, as if every moment she were going to roll over and over! Mr.
J------ was heaved off one of the sofas, and rolled along, till he was
stopped by the table. He then took his seat upon the floor, as the more
secure position; and, half an hour afterwards, another heave chucked him
back again upon the sofa. The captain snuffed out one of the candles,
and both being tied to the table, could not relight it with the other:
so the steward came to do it; when a sudden heel of the ship made him
extinguish the second candle, tumbled him upon the sofa on which I was
lying, and made the candle which he had brought with him fly out of the
candlestick, through a cabin window at his elbow; and thus we were all
left in the dark. Then the intolerable noise! the cracking of bulkheads!
the sawing of ropes! the screeching of the tiller! the trampling of
the sailors! the clattering of the crockery! Every thing above deck and
below deck, all in motion at once! Chairs, writing-desks, books, boxes,
bundles, fire-irons and fenders, flying to one end of the room; and the
next moment (as if they had made a mistake) flying back again to the
other with the same hurry and confusion! “Confusion worse confounded!”
Of all the inconveniences attached to a vessel, the incessant noise
appears to me the most insupportable! As to our live stock, they seem to
have made up their minds on the subject, and say with one of Ariosto’s
knights (when he was cloven from the head to the chine), “_or corvien
morire_” Our fowls and ducks are screaming and quacking their last by
dozens; and by Tuesday morning, it is supposed that we shall not have
an animal alive in the ship, except the black terrier--and my friend the
squeaking pig, whose vocal powers are still audible, maugre the storm
and the sailors, and who (I verily believe) only continues to survive
out of spite, because he can join in the general chorus, and help to
increase the number of abominable sounds.
We are now tossing about in the Bay of Biscay: I shall remember it as
long as I live. The “beef-eater’s front” could never have “beamed more
terrible” upon Don Ferolo Whiskerandos, “in Biscay’s Bay, when he took
him prisoner,” than Biscay’s Bay itself will appear to _me_ the next
time that I approach it.
NOVEMBER 20.
Our live stock has received an increase; our fowls and ducks are dead to
be sure, but a lark flew on board this morning, blown (as is supposed)
from the coast of France. In five minutes it appeared to be quite at
home, eat very readily whatever was given it, and hopped about the deck
without fear of the sailors, or the more formidable black terrier, with
all the ease and assurance imaginable.
I dare say, it _was_ blown from the coast of France!
NOVEMBER 21.
The weather continues intolerable. Boisterous waves running mountains
high, with no wind, or a foul one. Dead calms by day, which prevent
our making any progress; and violent storms by night, which prevent our
getting any sleep.
Every thing is in a state of perpetual motion. “_Nulla quies intus_ (nor
_outus_ indeed for the matter of that), _nullâque silentia parte_” We
drink our tea exactly as Tantalus did in the infernal regions; we keep
bobbing at the basin for half an hour together without being able to get
a drop; and certainly nobody on ship-board can doubt the truth of the
proverb, “Many things fall out between the cup and the lip.”
NOVEMBER 23.
PANDORA’S BOX. (Iliad A.)
Prometheus once (in Tooke the tale you’ll see)
In one vast box enclosed all human evils;
But curious Woman needs the inside would see,
And out came twenty thousand million devils.
The story’s spoil’d, and Tooke should well be chid;
The fact, sir, happen’d thus, and I’ve no doubt of it:
’Twas not that Woman raised the coffer’s lid,
But when the lid _was_ raised, Woman popp’d out of it.
“But Hope remain’d”--true, sir, she did; but still
All saw of what Miss Hope gave intimation;
Her right hand grasp’d an undertaker’s bill,
Her left conceal’d a deed of separation.
N. B. I was most horribly sea-sick when I took this view of the subject.
Besides, grapes on shipboard, in general, are remarkably sour.
NOVEMBER 24.
“Manibus date lilia plenis;
Purpureos spargam flores!”
The squeaking pig was killed this morning.
NOVEMBER 25.
Letters were sent to England by a small vessel bound for Plymouth, and
laden with oranges from St. Michael’s, one of the Azores.
NOVEMBER 26.
A complete and most violent storm, from twelve at night till seven the
next morning. The fore-top-sail, though only put up for the first time
yesterday, was rent from top to bottom; and several of the other sails
are torn to pieces. The perpetual tempestuous weather which we have
experienced has so shaken the planks of the vessel, that the sea enters
at all quarters. About one o’clock in the morning I was saluted by a
stream of water, which poured down exactly upon my face, and obliged me
to shift my lodgings. The carpenter had been made aware that there was
a leak in my cabin, and ordered to caulk the seams; but, I suppose,
he thought that during only a two months’ voyage, the rain might very
possibly never find out the hole, and that it would be quite time enough
to apply the remedy when I should have felt the inconvenience. The best
is, that the carpenter happening to be at work in the next cabin when
the water came down upon me, I desired him to call my servant, in order
that I might get up, on account of the leak; on which he told me “that
the leak could not be helped;” grumbled a good deal at calling up the
servant; and seemed to think me not a little unreasonable for not lying
quietly, and suffering myself to be pumped upon by this shower-bath of
his own providing.
But if the water gets _into_ the ship, on the other hand, last night the
poor old steward was very near getting out of it. In the thick of the
storm he was carrying some grog to the mate, when a gun, which drove
against him, threw him off his balance, and he was just passing through
one of the port-holes, when, luckily, he caught hold of a rope, and
saved himself. A screech-owl flew on board this morning: I am sure we
have no need of birds of ill omen; I could supply the place of a whole
aviary of them myself.
NOVEMBER 28.
Reading Don Quixote this morning, I was greatly pleased with an instance
of the hero’s politeness, which had never struck me before. The Princess
Micomicona having fallen into a most egregious blunder, he never so
much as hints a suspicion of her not having acted precisely as she
has stated, but only begs to know her reasons for taking a step so
extraordinary. “But pray, madam,” says he, “why _did_ your ladyship land
at Ossuna, seeing that it is not a seaport town?”
I was also much charmed with an instance of conjugal affection, in the
same work. Sancho being just returned home, after a long absence, the
first thing which his wife, Teresa, asks about, is the welfare of the
ass. “I have brought him back,” answers Sancho, “and in much better
health and condition than I am in myself.” “The Lord be praised,” said
Teresa, “for this his great mercy to me!”
NOVEMBER 29.
The wind continues contrary, and the weather is as disagreeable and
perverse as it can well be; indeed, I understand that in these latitudes
nothing can be expected but heavy gales or dead calms, which makes them
particularly pleasant for sailing, especially as the calms are by far
the most disagreeable of the two: the wind steadies the ship; but when
she creeps as slowly as she does at present (scarcely going a mile in
four hours), she feels the whole effect of the sea breaking against
her, and rolls backwards and forwards with every billow as it rises and
falls. In the mean while, every thing seems to be in a state of the most
active motion, except the ship; while we are carrying a spoonful of soup
to our mouths, the remainder takes the “glorious golden opportunity” to
empty itself into our laps, and the glasses and salt-cellars carry on
a perpetual domestic warfare during the whole time of dinner, like the
Guelphs and the Ghibellines. Nothing is so common as to see a roast
goose suddenly jump out of its dish in the middle of dinner, and make
a frisk from one end of the table to the other; and we are quite in the
habit of laying wagers which of the two boiled fowls will arrive at the
bottom first.
N.B. To-day the fowl without the liver wing was the favourite, but the
knowing ones were taken in; the uncarved one carried it hollow.
NOVEMBER 30
“Do those I love e’er think on me?”
How oft that painful doubt will start,
To blight the roseate smile of glee,
And cloud the brow, and sink the heart!
No more can I, estranged from home,
Their pleasures share, nor soothe their moans
To them I’m dead as were the foam
Now breaking o’er my whitening bones.
And doubtless now with newer friends,
The tide of life content they stem;
Nor on the sailor think, who bends
Full many an anxious thought on them.
Should that reflection cause me pain?
No ease for mine their grief could bring;
Enough if, when we meet again,
Their answering hearts to greet me spring.
Enough, if no dull joyless eye
Give signs of kindness quite forgot;
Nor heartless question, cold reply,
Speak--“all is past; I love you not.”
Too much has heav’n ordain’d of woe,
Too much of groans on earth abounds,
For me to wish one tear to flow
Which brings no balm for sorrow’s wounds.
Love’s moisten’d lid and Friendship’s sigh,
I could not see, I could not hear!
To think “they weep!” more fills mine eye,
And smarts the more each tender tear.
Then, if there be one heart so kind,
It mourns each hour the loss of me;
Shrinks, when it hears some gust of wind,
And sighs--“Perhaps a storm at sea!”
Oh! if there be an heart _indeed_,
Which beats for me, so sad, so true,
Swift to its aid, Oblivion, speed,
And bathe it with thy poppy’s dew;
My form in vapours to conceal,
From Pleasure’s wreath rich odours shake;
Nor let that heart one moment feel
Such pangs as force my own to ache.
Demon of Memory, cherish’d grief!
Oh, could I break thy wand in twain!
Oh, could I close thy magic leaf,
Till those I love are mine again!
DECEMBER 1. (FRIDAY.)
The captain to-day pointed oat to me a sailor-boy, who, about three
years ago, was shaken from the mast-head, and fell through the scuttle
into the hold; the distance was above eighty feet, yet the boy was taken
up with only a few bruises.
DECEMBER 3. (SUNDAY.)
The wind during the last two days has been more favourable; and at nine
this morning we were in the latitude of Madeira.
DECEMBER 5.
Sea Terms.--_Ratlines_, the rope ladders by which the sailors climb
the shrouds; the _companion_, the cabin-head; _reefs_, the divisions by
which the sails are contracted; _stunsails_, additional sails, spread
for the purpose of catching all the wind possible; the fore-mast,
main-mast, mizen-mast; _fore_, the head; _aft_, the stern; _being
pooped_ (the very sound of which tells one, that it must be something
very terrible), having the stern beat in by the sea; _to belay a rope_,
to fasten it.
DECEMBER 6.
I had no idea of the expense of building and preserving a ship: that in
which I am at present cost £30,000 at its outset. Last year the repairs
amounted to £14,000; and in a voyage to the East Indies they were more
than £20,000. In its return last year from Jamaica it was on the very
brink of shipwreck. A storm had driven it into Bantry Bay, and there
was no other refuge from the winds than Bear Haven, whose entrance
was narrow and difficult; however, a gentleman from Castletown came on
board, and very obligingly offered to pilot the ship. He was one of the
first people in the place, had been the owner of a vessel himself, was
most thoroughly acquainted with every inch of the haven, &c. &c., and so
on they went. There was but one sunken rock, and that about ten feet in
diameter; the captain knew it, and warned his gentleman-pilot to keep
a little more to the eastward. “My dear friend,” answered the Irishman,
“now do just make yourself _asy_; I know well enough what we are
about; we are as clear of the rock as if we were in the Red Sea, by
Jasus;”--upon which the vessel struck upon the rock, and there she
stuck. The captain fell to swearing and tearing his hair. “God damn you,
sir! didn’t I tell you to keep to eastward? Dam’me, she’s on the rock!”
“Oh! well, my dear, she’s now _on_ the rock, and, in a few minutes, you
know, why she’ll be _off_ the rock: to be sure, I’d have taken my oath
that the rock was two hundred and fifty feet on the other side of her,
but----“--“Two hundred and fifty feet! why, the channel is not two
hundred and fifty feet wide itself! and as to getting her off, bumping
against this rock, it can only be with a great hole in her side.”--“Poh!
now, bother, my dear! why sure----“--“Leave the ship, sir; dam’me, sir,
get out of my ship this moment!” Instead of which, with the most smiling
and obliging air in the world, the Irishman turned to console the
female passengers. “Make yourselves _asy_, ladies, pray make yourselves
perfectly _asy_; but, upon my soul, I believe your captain’s mad; no
danger in life! only make yourselves _asy_, I say; for the ship lies on
the rock as safe and as quiet, by Jasus, as if she were lying on a mud
bank!” Luckily the weather was so perfectly calm, that the ship having
once touched the rock with her keel bumped no more. It was low water;
she wanted but five inches to float her, and when the tide rose she
drifted off, and with but little harm done. The gentleman-pilot then
thought proper to return on shore, took a very polite leave of the
lady-passengers, and departed with all the urbanity possible; only
+thinking the captain the strangest person that he had ever met with;
and wondering that any man of common sense could be put out of temper by
such a trifle.
DECEMBER 7.
Yesterday we had the satisfaction of falling in with the trade wind, and
now we are proceeding both rapidly and steadily. The change of climate
is very perceptible; and the deep and beautiful blue which colours the
sea is a certain intimation of our approach to the tropic. A few flying
fish have made their appearance; and the spears are getting in order
for the reception of their constant attendant, the dolphin. These spears
have ropes affixed to them, and at one end of the pole are five barbs,
at the other a heavy ball of lead: then, when the fish is speared, the
striker lets the staff fall, on which down goes the lead into the sea,
and up goes the dolphin into the air, who is in the utmost astonishment
to find itself all of a sudden turned into a flying fish; so determines
to cultivate the art of flying for the future, and promises itself
a great many pleasant airings. The dolphin and the flying fish are
beautifully coloured, and both are very good food, particularly the
latter, which move in shoals like the herring, and are about the size
of that fish. They are supposed to feed on spawn and sea animalculæ,
and will not take the bait; but on the shores of Barbadoes, which they
frequent in great multitudes, they are caught in wide nets, spread upon
the surface of the sea; then, upon beating the waters around, the fish
rise in clouds, and fly till, their fins getting dry, they fall down
into the nets which have been spread to receive them. The dolphin is
seldom above three feet long; the immense strength which he exerts in
his struggles for liberty occasions the necessity of catching him in the
way before described.
DECEMBER 8.
At three o’clock this afternoon we entered the tropic of Cancer; and if
our wind continues tolerably favourable, we may expect to see Antigua on
Sunday. On crossing the line, it was formerly usual for ships
to receive a visit from an old gentleman and his wife, Mr. and Mrs.
Cancer: the husband was, by profession, a barber; and, probably, the
scullion, who insisted so peremptorily on shaving Sancho, at the duke’s
castle, had served an apprenticeship to Mr. Cancer, for their mode of
proceeding was much alike, and, indeed, very peculiar: the old gentleman
always made a point of using a rusty iron hoop instead of a razor, tar
for soap, and an empty beef-barrel was, in his opinion, the very best
possible substitute for a basin; in consequence of which, instead of
paying him for shaving them, people of taste were disposed to pay for
not being shaved; and as Mrs. Cancer happened to be particularly partial
to gin (when good), the gift of a few bottles was generally successful
in rescuing the donor’s chin from the hands of her husband; however,
to-day this venerable pair “peradventure were sleeping, or on a
journey,” for we neither saw nor heard any thing about them.
DECEMBER 9.
When, after his victory of the 1st of June, Lord Howe again put to sea
from Portsmouth, the number of women who were turned on shore out of the
ships (wives, sisters, &c.) amounted to above thirty thousand!
DECEMBER 10. (Sunday.)
What triumph moves on the billows so blue?
In his car of pellucid pearl I view,
With glorious pomp, on the dancing tide,
The tropic Genius proudly ride.
The flying fish, who trail his car,
Dazzle the eye, as they shine from afar;
Twinkling their fins in the sun, and show
All the hues which adorn the showery bow.
Of dark sea-blue is the mantle he wears;
For a sceptre a plantain branch he bears;
Pearls his sable arms surround,
And his locks of wool with coral are crown’d.
Perpetual sunbeams round him stream;
His bronzed limbs shine with golden gleam;
The spicy spray from his wheels that showers,
Makes the sense ache with its odorous powers.
Myriads of monsters, who people the caves
Of ocean, attendant plough the waves;
Sharks and crocodiles bask in his blaze,
And whales spout the waters which dance in his rays.
And as onward floats that triumph gay,
The light sea-breezes around it play;
While at his royal feet lie bound
The Ouragans, hush’d in sleep profound.
Dark Genius, hear a stranger’s prayer,
Nor suffer those winds to ravage and tear
Jamaica’s savannas, and loose to fly,
Mingling the earth, and the sea, and the sky.
From thy locks on my harvest of sweets diffuse,
To swell my canes, refreshing dews;
And kindly breathe, with cooling powers,
Through my coffee walks and shaddock bowers.
Let not thy strange diseases prey
On my life; but scare from my couch away
The yellow Plague’s imps; and safe let me rest
From that dread black demon, who racks the breast:
Nor force my throbbing temples to know
Thy sunbeam’s sudden and maddening blow;
Nor bid thy day-flood blaze too bright
On nerves so fragile, and brain so light:
And let me, returning in safety, view
Thy triumph again on the ocean blue;
And in Britain I’ll oft with flowers entwine
The Tropic Sovereign’s ebony shrine!
Was it but fancy? did He not frown,
And in anger shake his coral crown?
Gorgeous and slow the pomp moves on!
Low sinks the sun--and all is gone!
“And pray now do you mean to say that you really saw all this fine
show?” Oh, yes, really, “in my mind’s eye, Horatio,” as Shakspeare says;
or, if you like it better in Greek--
[Greek line] Odyssey, A.
DECEMBER 11.
A dead centipes was found on the deck, supposed to have made its way on
board, during the last voyage, among the logwood. This is not the only
species of disagreeable passengers, who are in the habit of introducing
themselves into homeward bound vessels without leave. While sleeping
on deck last year, the Captain felt something run across his face; and,
supposing it to be a cock-roach, he brushed off a scorpion; but not
without its first biting him upon the cheek: the pain for about four
hours was excessive; but although he did no more than wash the wound
with spirits, he was perfectly well again in a couple of days.
DECEMBER 12.
Since we entered the tropic, the rains have been incessant, and most
violent; but the wind was brisk and favourable, and we proceeded
rapidly. Now we have lost the trade-wind, and move so slowly, that it
might almost be called standing still. On the other hand, the weather
is now perfectly delicious; the ship makes but little way, but she moves
steadily: the sun is brilliant; the sky cloudless; the sea calm, and so
smooth that it looks like one extended sheet of blue glass; an awning is
stretched over the deck; although there is not wind enough to fill the
canvass, there is sufficient to keep the air cool, and thus, even
during the day, the weather is very pleasant; but the nights are quite
heavenly, and so bright, that at ten o’clock yesterday evening little
Jem Parsons (the cabin boy), and his friend the black terrier, came on
deck, and sat themselves down on a gun-carriage, to read by the light of
the moon. I looked at the boy’s book, (the terrier, I suppose, read over
the other’s shoulder,) and found that it was “The Sorrows of Werter.” I
asked who had lent him such a book, and whether it amused him? He said
that it had been made a present to him, and so he had read it almost
through, for he had got to Werter’s dying; though, to be sure, he did
not understand it all, nor like very much what he understood; for he
thought the man a great fool for killing himself _for love_. I told him
I thought every man a great fool who killed himself for love or for any
thing else: but had he no books but “The Sorrows of Werter?”--Oh dear,
yes, he said, he had a great many more; he had got “The Adventures of
a Louse,” which was a very curious book, indeed; and he had got besides
“The Recess,” and “Valentine and Orson,” and “Ros-lin Castle,” and a
book of Prayers, just like the Bible; but he could not but say that he
liked “The Adventures of a Louse” the best of any of them.
DECEMBER 13.
We caught a dolphin, but not with the spear: he gorged a line which was
fastened to the stern, and baited with salt pork; but being a very large
and strong fish, his efforts to escape were so powerful, that it
was feared that he would break the line, and a _grainse_ (as the
dolphin-spear is technically termed) was thrown at him: he was struck,
and three of the prongs were buried in his side; yet, with a violent
effort, he forced them out again, and threw the lance up into the air. I
am not much used to take pleasure in the sight of animal suffering; but
if Pythagoras himself had been present, and “of opinion that the soul
of his grandam might haply inhabit” this dolphin, I think he must
still have admired the force and agility displayed in his endeavours to
escape. Imagination can picture nothing more beautiful than the colours
of this fish: while covered by the waves he was entirely green; and as
the water gave him a case of transparent crystal, he really looked like
one solid piece of living emerald; when he sprang into the air, or swam
fatigued upon the surface, his fins alone preserved their green, and
the rest of his body appeared to be of the brightest yellow, his scales
shining like gold wherever they caught the sun; while the blood
which, as long as he remained in the sea, continued to spout in great
quantities, forced its way upwards through the water, like a wreath of
crimson smoke, and then dispersed itself in separate globules among the
spray. From the great loss of blood, his colours soon became paler;
but when he was at length safely landed on deck, and beating himself to
death against the flooring, agony renewed all the lustre of his tints:
his fins were still green and his body golden, except his back, which
was olive, shot with bright deep blue; his head and belly became
silvery, and the spots with which the latter was mottled changed,
with incessant rapidity, from deep olive to the most beautiful azure.
Gradually his brilliant tints disappeared: they were succeeded by one
uniform shade of slate-colour; and when he was quite dead, he exhibited
nothing but dirty brown and dull dead white. As soon as all was over
with him, the first thing done was to convert one of his fins into
the resemblance of a flying fish, for the purpose of decoying other
dolphins; and the second, to order some of the present gentleman to be
got ready for dinner. He measured above four feet and a half.
DECEMBER 14.
At noon to-day, we found ourselves in the latitude of Jamaica. We were
promised the sight of Antigua on Sunday next, but that is now quite out
of the question. We made but eight miles in the whole of yesterday; and
as Jamaica is still at the distance of eighteen hundred miles, at this
rate of proceeding we may expect to reach it about eight months hence.
The sky this evening presented us with quite a new phenomenon, a
rose-coloured moon: she is to be at her full to-morrow; and this
afternoon, about half-past four, she rose like a disk of silver,
perfectly white and colourless; but, as she was exactly opposite to the
sun at the time of his setting, the reflection of his rays spread a kind
of pale blush over her orb, which produced an effect as beautiful as
singular. Indeed, the size and inconceivable brilliance of the sun, the
clearness of the atmosphere, which had assumed a faint greenish hue,
and was entirely without a cloud, the smoothness of the ocean, and the
aforesaid rose-coloured moon, altogether rendered this sunset the most
magical in effect that I ever beheld; and it was with great reluctance
that I was called away from admiring it, to ascertain whether the merits
of our new acquaintance, the dolphin, extended any further than his
skin. Part of him, which was boiled for yesterday’s dinner, was rather
coarse and dry, and might have been mistaken for indifferent haddock.
But his having been steeped in brine, and then broiled with a good deal
of pepper and salt, had improved him wonderfully; and to-day I thought
him as good as any other fish.
Our wind is like Lady Townley’s separate allowance: “that little has
been made less;” or, rather, it has dwindled away to nothing. We are now
so absolutely becalmed, that I begin seriously to suspect all the crew
of being Phæacians; and that at this identical moment Neptune is amusing
himself by making the ship take root in the ocean; a trick which he
played once before to a vessel (they say) in the days of Ulysses. I
have got some locust plants on board in pots: if we continue to sail
as slowly as we have done for the last week, before we reach Jamaica my
plants will be forest trees, little Jem, the cabin-boy, will have been
obliged to shave, and the black terrier will have died of old age long
ago. Great numbers of porpoises were playing about to-day, and tumbling
under the ship’s very nose. When in their gambols they allow themselves
to be seen above the surface, they are of a dirty blackish brown, and as
ugly as heart can wish; but in the waves they acquire a fine sea-green
cast, and their spouting up water in the sunbeams is extremely
ornamental.
THE HELMSMAN.
Hark! the bell 1 it sounds midnight!--all hail, thou new
heav’n!
How soft sleep the stars on their bosom of night!
While o’er the full moon, as they gently are driven,
Slowly floating the clouds bathe their fleeces in light.
The warm feeble breeze scarcely ripples the ocean,
And all seems so hush’d, all so happy to feel!
So smooth glides the bark, I perceive not her motion,
While low sings the sailor who watches the wheel.
That sailor I’ve noted--his cheek, fresh and blooming
With health, scarcely yet twenty springs can have
seen;
His looks they are lofty, but never presuming,
His limbs strong, but light, and undaunted his mien.
Frank and clear is his brow, yet a thoughtful expression,
Half tender, half mournful, oft shadows his eye;
And murmurs escape him, which make the confession,
If not check’d by a hem, they had swell’d to a sigh.
His song is not pour’d to beguile the lone hour,
When in-watch on deck ’tis his duty to keep;
Nor of painful reflection to weaken the power,
Nor chase from his eyelids the pinions of sleep.
Tis so sad...’tis so sweet... and some tones come so
swelling,
So right from the heart, and so pure to the ear;--
That sure at this moment his thoughts must be dwelling
On one who is absent, most kind and most dear.
Perhaps on a mother his mind loves to linger,
Whose wants to relieve, the rough seas hath he
cross’d;
Who kiss’d him at parting, and vow’d he could bring her
No jewel so dear as the one she then lost!
No, no! ’tis a sweetheart, his soul’s cherish’d treasure,
Those full melting notes... hark! he breathes them
again!
So mournful, and yet they’re prolong’d with such plea
sure........
Oh, nothing but love could have prompted the strain.
Yet, whate’er be the cause of thy sadness, young seaman,
That the weight be soon lighten’d, I send up my vow;
From the stings of remorse, I’ll be sworn, thou’rt a
freeman,
No guilt ever ruffled the smooth of that brow!
That sigh which you breath’d sprang from pensive
affection;
That song, though so plaintive, sheds balm on the
heart;
And the pain which you feel at each fond recollection,
Is worth all the pleasures that vice could impart.
Oh, still may the scenes of your life, like the present,
Shine bright to the eye, and speak calm to the breast;
May each wave flow as gentle, each breeze play as
pleasant,
And warm as the clime prove the friends you love best!
And may she, who now dictates that ballad so tender,
Diffuse o’er your days the heart’s solace and ease,
As yon lovely moon, with a gleam of mild splendour,
Pure, tranquil, and bright, over-silvers the seas!
DECEMBER 16.
What little wind there is blows so perversely, that we have been obliged
to alter our course; and instead of Antigua, we are now told that the
Summer Islands (Shakspeare’s “still vexed Bermoothes”) are the first
land that we must expect to see.
I am greatly disappointed at finding such a scarcity of monsters; I had
flattered myself, that as soon as we should enter the Atlantic Ocean,
or at least the tropic, we should have seen whole shoals of sharks,
whales, and dolphins wandering about as plenty as sheep upon the South
Downs: instead of which, a brace of dolphins, and a few flying fish and
porpoises, are the only inhabitants of the ocean who have as yet taken
the trouble of paying us the common civility of a visit. However, I am
promised, that as soon as we approach the islands, I shall have as many
sharks as heart can wish.
As I am particularly fond of proofs of conjugal attachment between
animals (in the human species they are so universal that I set no store
by them), an instance of that kind which the captain related to me this
morning gave me great pleasure. While lying in Black River harbour,
Jamaica, two sharks were frequently seen playing about the ship;
at length the female was killed, and the desolation of the male was
excessive:--
“Che faro senz’ Eurydice?”
What he did _without_ her remains a secret, but what he did _with_ her
was clear enough; for scarce was the breath out of his Eurydice’s
body, when he stuck his teeth in her, and began to eat her up with all
possible expedition. Even the sailors felt their sensibility excited
by so peculiar a mark of posthumous attachment; and to enable him to
perform this melancholy duty the more easily, they offered to be his
carvers, lowered their boat, and proceeded to chop his better half in
pieces with their hatchets; while the widower opened his jaws as wide
as possible, and gulped down pounds upon pounds of the dear departed as
fast as they were thrown to him, with the greatest delight and all the
avidity imaginable. I make no doubt that all the while he was eating, he
was thoroughly persuaded that every morsel which went into his
stomach would make its way to his heart directly! “She was perfectly
consistent,” he said to himself; “she was excellent through life,
and really she’s extremely good now she’s dead!” and then, “unable to
conceal his pain,”
“He sigh’d and swallow’d, and sigh’d and swallow’d,
And sigh’d and swallow’d again.”
I doubt, whether the annals of Hymen can produce a similar instance
of post-obitual affection. Certainly Calderon’s “_Amor despues de la
Muerte_” has nothing that is worthy to be compared to it; nor do I
recollect in history any fact at all resembling it, except perhaps a
circumstance which is recorded respecting Cambletes, King of Lydia, a
monarch equally remarkable for his voracity and uxoriousness; and who,
being one night completely overpowered by sleep, and at the same time
violently tormented by hunger, eat up his queen without being conscious
of it, and was mightily astonished, the next morning, to wake with
her hand in his mouth, the only bit that was left of her. But then,
Cambletes was quite unconscious what he was doing; whereas, the shark’s
mark of attachment was evidently intentional. It may, however, be
doubted, from the voracity with which he eat, whether his conduct on
this occasion was not as much influenced by the sentiment of hunger as
of love; and if he were absolutely on the point of starving, Tasso might
have applied to this couple, with equal truth, although with somewhat a
different meaning, what he says of his “Amanti e Sposi;”--
----“Pende
D’ un fato sol e l’ una e l’ altra vita
for if Madam Shark had not died first, Monsieur must have died himself
for want of a dinner.
DECEMBER 17. (Sunday.)
On this day, from a sense of propriety no doubt, as well as from having
nothing else to do, all the crew in the morning betook themselves to
their studies. The carpenter was very seriously spelling a comedy;
Edward was engaged with “The Six Princesses of Babylon;” a third was
amusing himself with a tract “On the Management of Bees;” another had
borrowed the cabin-boy’s “Sorrows of Werter,” and was reading it aloud
to a large circle--some whistling--and others yawning; and Werter’s
abrupt transitions, and exclamations, and raptures, and refinements,
read in the same loud monotonous tone, and without the slightest respect
paid to stops, had the oddest effect possible. “She did not look at me;
I thought my heart would burst; the coach drove off; she looked out of
the window; was that look meant for me? yes it was; perhaps it might be;
do not tell me that it was not meant for me. Oh, my friend, my friend,
am I not a fool, a madman?” (This part is rather stupid, or so, you
see, but no matter for that; where was I? oh!) “I am now sure, Charlotte
loves me: I prest my hand on my heart; I said ‘Klopstock;’ yes,
Charlotte loves me; what! does Charlotte love me? oh, rapturous thought!
my brain turns round:--Immortal powers!--how!--what!--oh, my friend, my
friend,” &c. &c. &c. I was surprised to find that (except Edward’s Fairy
Tale) none of them were reading works that were at all likely to amuse
them (Smollett or Fielding, for instance), or any which might interest
them as relating to their profession, such as voyages and travels;
much less any which had the slightest reference to the particular day.
However, as most of them were reading what they could not possibly
understand, they might mistake them for books of devotion, for any
thing they knew to the contrary; or, perhaps, they might have so much
reverence for all books in print, as to think that, provided they did
but read something, it was doing a good work, and it did not much matter
what. So one of Congreve’s fine ladies swears Mrs. Mincing, the waiting
maid, to secrecy, “upon an odd volume of Messalina’s Poems.” Sir Dudley
North, too, informs us, (or is it his brother Roger? but I mean the
Turkey merchant: ):--that at Constantinople the respect for printed
books is so great, that when people are sick, they fancy that they can
be _read_ into health again; and if the Koran should not be in the way,
they will make a shift with a few verses of the Bible, or a chapter or
two of the Talmud, or of any other book that comes first to hand, rather
than not read something. I think Sir Dudley says, that he himself cured
an old Turk of the toothache, by administering a few pages of “Ovid’s
Metamorphoses;” and in an old receipt-book, we are directed for the
cure of a double tertian fever, “to drink plentifully of cock-broth, and
sleep with the Second Book of the Iliad under the pillow.” If, instead
of sleeping with it under the pillow, the doctor had desired us to read
the Second Book of the Iliad in order that we _might_ sleep, I should
have had some faith in his prescription myself.
DECEMBER 19.
During these last two days nothing very extraordinary, or of sufficient
importance to deserve its being handed down to the latest posterity, has
occurred; except that this morning a swinging rope knocked my hat into
the sea, and away it sailed upon a voyage of discovery, like poor La
Perouse, to return no more, I suppose; unless, indeed,--like Polycrates,
the fortunate tyrant of Samos, who threw his favourite ring into the
ocean, and found it again in the stomach of the first fish that was
served up at his table,--I should have the good luck (but I by no means
reckon upon it) to catch a dolphin with my hat upon his head: as to a
porpoise, he never could squeeze his great numskull into it; but our
dolphin of last week was much about my own size, and I dare say such
another would find my hat fit him to a miracle, and look very well in
it.
DECEMBER 20.